3/02/2017

Headline March 03, 2017/ ''' *THE-SOLE* OF STUDENT '''

''' *THE-SOLE* OF STUDENT '''

PITY THE STUDENT. PITY THE MAN. Where women can dress up anything, really anything, with a choice pair of shoes-

Male footwear offers a pathetic redundancy of variety.

A women can wear whatever she chooses so long as as she wears the right shoes. For her, shoes can transform even the most lacklustre of outfits into something directional, interesting and pretty:

Add a pair of fur-lined Gucci loafers or pastel patent MiuMiu Mary Janes to a workaday outfit of jeans and T-shirt , for example, and one becomes a *maven of advanced fashion authority*.

A woman can inhabit Left Bank chic quicker than you can say ''Gauloise'' simply by slipping into classic black Manolo Blahnik court.

FOR GIRL STUDENTS, the shoes is a vital weapon in one's arsenal of fashion peacockery: the quickest, easiest shorthand for sartorial clout.

They rarely allow the question of utility to impede their judgment. No matter that those two floating stilts will crucify her ankles, blister her heels and scorch her feet, after a two minute commute from her van to her desk.

Men, on the other hand, labour under the pernicious impressions that footwear should have some practical purpose. For men, shoes are still regarded as things that cover one's feet -or, even more prosaically, things to walk in.

Choices are limited, the options fairly straight. What makes men's choice, therefore, the most readable keys to their emotional health.

As I see it, there are five shifts in attitude when it comes to male footwear, and you can establish exactly where a chap is on the timeline of life from a two-second analysis below the ankle-

*Each stage marks a new stage in his emotional development,

It starts with the school shoe, the Primary Stage, a rather unlovely, boyish lace-up that will march a lad through early infancy and secondary school and often into a first job.

These boys are sweet, kind, earnest. Handle with caution.

At this point , they'll enter the Ukysses Chapter [cos, you know, they're wondering the world being adventurous] .

Metrosexuals working in creative jobs will favour the trainer, making specialist purchases from dealers with whom they can engage in long, tedious conversations about exotic foreign imports, limited editions and colourways.

They will be serial shaggers [never trust a man who queues online for a Yeezy II]. Better the boy in a neutral classic -Adidas in =Stan Smiths, Nike Air Max, a New Balance 574 -all styles and models that have been vigorously stress-tested for kudos by previous generations.

Some men will wear Puma or Reebok, these will be those who actually do sports after hours, or something, and will never be wrenched from their footy-friends : ie, draining.

Meanwhile, those in the City Jobs, or offices where suits are mandatory, still have to adventure in a variant of school shoe. In a bid to make the Oedipal cord, however, they'll use this opportunity to pimp their options.

Some will invest in ''fashion shoes'' with strange patinas, in colours like caramel or burgundy.

Many will decide this is the time to trial an extreme pointed toe, or cowboy boot, or Cuban heel, or embellishment of jangly buckles.

The trouble with a pimped shoe? You look like a pimp. Or an estate agent. Or a sex pest. As with the school shoe, these Ulysses still won't get you anywhere.

Which brings us to the Smug Era, when a man's choice of footwear is made, not by his mother, but by his friends or wife. Sensible, sober shoes, in other words, but with sexy little touches.

The smug might start wearing a combat or a utility boot, a style his wife will love because, frankly, what women doesn't secretly harbour fantasies about her man doing heavy labour down a mineshaft?

Others will opt for a desert boot, or one of those queerly leg-foreshortening, Cornish pasties of suede one buys from old school, high-street brands like Clarks.

These will look especially Smug when accessorised with a BabyBjorn, but will cause great amusement when the crepe soles turn into ice skates on rain-slicked pavements.

And so, following the realisations that a crepe sole is rubbish in the rain, trainers are only really acceptable after the age of 45 on Alan Alda, US college professors and tech billionaires-

And that combat boots take an to lace and make your legs ache, the male foot soldier will reach the phase of the Oxford.

These shoes are the signifiers of independent thought, possible mid-life crisis and a healthy bank balance.

They will be purchased, -without guidance, from one of those dusty artisanal cobblers whose names might befit a gathering of elderly geography teachers -Loake, Crockett, Jones, Lobb, Cheaney,.......

These venerable Messrs of leather goods will indulge our man in gentle conversation and esteemed, if slightly creepy, service. They will be hateful towards all wives.

These shoes will give their wearers a little Ian Flemming flush and remind them of their fathers, especially when the pain of breaking them in makes them weep.

*Which brings us finally to the Nirvana Phase and the *Age of The Slipper*, the leathery bandage of comfort that sheathes the weary of spirit and swollen of ankle*.

Here, finally, will be the shoe he has wanted to wear his whole life.

*This is the age when physical strength, ambition and intent will have fully matured and no one -no one- will tell him what to do. {this could also be called the Philip Green Phase.}*

They will curtail all physical and social activity to prevent ever having to remove them, and become especially maudlin about their state of disrepair.

This man will be a demanding sort, irritable, bothersome, and selectively deaf.

But now, with their adventuring constrained by water-absorbent soles, you'll know one thing for sure.

*He'll be a keeper*.

With most respectful and loving dedication to these very great and very high class humans, for their invincible support for the World Students Society: